His Kingdom for a Chocobo
by The Inimitable DA
Summary: Reno goes Winter Day shopping for Yuffie. How much trouble can one man get into buying a simple present? Well, when we're talking about Reno... A Christmas 2004 fic for Reno Spiegel.


**His Kingdom for a Chocobo**

by DarkAngel

_Disclaimer:_ I don't own Final Fantasy VII or any of the characters, places, etc. Square-Enix does. I also don't own Schmidt. I stole him from Reno Spiegel, for whom this fic is dedicated. The concept of Winter Day has been tossed about by a number of authors, to the point where I don't even know where it began. I will give credit where it's due, if you tell me, though. :)

On with the show, I say!

* * *

Reno knew he shouldn't have left it for as long as he had. When he woke up on the 24th of November, the eve of Winter Day, he woke with the deep, foreboding type of dread he normally felt when he couldn't remember what he had gotten up to the night before, and wasn't sure some woman wouldn't be holding a gun to his head or have already made off with his pants and the contents within. Of course, there was no need to take the pants too, but most women Reno associated with seemed vindictive in their need to spite the redheaded Turk.

Normally, Reno didn't look upon a holiday with such lacking enthusiasm. A holiday, after all, usually meant quality time spent with his pals, Jack, Daniel and Captain Morgan. Gin and Ton-

He groaned. No, this year's Winter Day promised much misery on his part. Damn Reeve, anyway. Or Tseng. Or Vincent by proxy if he really wanted to split hairs. Either way he looked at it, this whole sorry mess was everyone's fault but his.

Reeve had decided that holiday spirit was distinctly lacking in the newly reformed Shinra conglomerate and had instituted a secret gift exchange that the top brass were strongly "encouraged" to participate in; it was his belief that this would prompt a top down surge of goodwill and cheer through all the company ranks. Reno thought it was all a load of shit and a sure sign that the president needed to go out and get laid more.

Of course the Turks had been included in the man's count of the upper brass. Reno had no idea what had gone down, but the next thing he knew he was being told by Tseng in no uncertain terms that if he didn't go along with Reeve's making merry gimmick, he could look forward to the next two weeks scrubbing the toilets in the building. Reno had, in his enlightened state of mind, taken the high road on this and taken the slip of paper the Wutaian man had handed him.

Still in bed, Reno groaned again, wondering if it would be easier to suffocate himself in the toilet, then remembered that Tseng always kept a Life materia on hand for emergencies just like his. He would probably be revived and made to live through something thoroughly inhuman and ignominious to pacify the man's sadistic wrath.

A defeated hand limply dropped to the side of the bed, grabbing at the air in the vicinity until it came upon a pair of pants (Reno felt a brief surge of relief). Searching briefly, he found a crumpled wad of paper in one of the pockets and brought his arm back up. Not quite daring to open his eyes yet, he uncrinkled the paper. When he was sure it was smoothed out enough, he opened his eyes.

Oh, fuck.

Written in Reeve's neat hand was the person he was supposed to get a gift for.

Yuffie Kisaragi.

_T-14:23_

Reno stepped out into a hazy Neo Midgar afternoon. He had sat in his apartment numbly for about an hour, at first cursing his luck at getting the ex-Avalanche brat, of all people, then madly wracking his brain trying to figure out what to get her in the first place.

In the end, the image of the brat camping out by Elena's desk and riffling through a catalogue had clicked in his brain. He remembered Elena telling him that Yuffie was an avid collector of Chocobos, be they stuffed, ceramic or the real thing. He had snorted and told Yuffie that this disturbing hobby of hers was the reason she was still single – who in their right mind would want to date somebody with an oversized bird fetish? It was like dating the cat lady, the only difference being that he'd likely get his balls pecked off as opposed to gouged. The diminutive PR liaison officer had promptly thrown the catalogue at his head. The blunt edge of the damned thing had left a bleeding dent on his forehead, the mark of which hadn't gone away for days, even after the materia.

Sighing, Reno got in his car, heading west for the shopping district. There was only one place to go for something as kooky as this.

_T-14:09_

He pulled up in front of Cactaur Jack's Curiosity Shoppe, a knickknack store that was bound to have what he needed. With any luck, he could be in and out of there and on his way to drinking in fifteen minutes.

When he stepped into the shop he had to prevent a wince at the off key rendition of "Mister Schmidt is Coming to Town" playing in the background. Approaching the counter of the shop, Reno rang the service bell, this time making no effort to hide his grimace when instead of a polite chime, he got a raucous cacophony of Chocobos warking in greeting.

A fat, smiling man appeared from the back and Reno blinked, the lyrics from the Winter Day carol choosing that moment to penetrate to his brain.

"_He sees you when you're sleeping,_

_He knows when you're awake,_

_He knows if you've been cruel or swell,_

_So be good for Schmidt or else! Oh!"_

The man in front of him looked just like those department store Schmidts he'd been taken by his mother to see, down to the snow white beard, the rosy pink cheeks and red velour suit with just the right amount of overhanging belly. He'd even be willing to bet that the man had a billy club holstered in his jacket somewhere.

"May I help you?" The man said. Reno didn't answer for a long moment. He was reliving those childhood memories, the ones where he was turned face down on Schmidt's lap, receiving the smacking of a lifetime for being a horrible brat. Never once had he gotten anything good out of the fat bastard, and he remembered looking upon a visit to Schmidt as something akin to a root canal without the anaesthetic.

Reno realized he was being spoken to, and blinked himself out of his memories.

"Ah, yeah. I'm looking for a present."

Schmidt – Cactaur Jack – whichever he was chortled, and Reno had another flashback of hobbling through the department store, humiliated, rubbing at his sore bottom. He scowled to himself. Now was not the time to be reliving his shitty childhood.

"A gift, huh?" Sch – Cactaur Jack was saying, ignorant of Reno's inner stroll down memory lane. "For a friend?"

"A-" He was all prepared to say "brat", but Sch – Jack's unblinking blue eyes were putting him off. Somewhere in the back of his mind, he heard the smack of a billy club. Shaking his head fiercely, he scowled further.

"A co-worker." He said at last.

Schmidt nodded, all smiles. "Have you got something in mind already?" At Reno's blank stare, which he took as a no, Schmidt shook his head. "Guess not. Why don't you have a look at this, sonny?" He pushed a catalogue Reno recognized as being the one Yuffie had been looking at before across the counter. He flipped through the catalogue, mentally stomping on memories that were working harder at bubbling to the surface now. Damn, he needed a drink.

He came across a page that tugged at his more recent memories and blinked at the brightly coloured page. In flourishing red and gold print was the header, "Porcelain Collection, 2004." Under that was a smaller subline telling him to order today before time ran out. Five different Chocobos were displayed, the biggest one in a place of prominence in the centre. The Ho Ho Ho Chocobo. Only two thousand and four made. This was what Yuffie wanted.

He looked up, purposely avoiding Schmidt's eyes and jabbed the page. "This one."

Schmidt peered across to where Reno's finger was. "The Ho Ho Ho Chocobo?"

Reno nodded curtly.

Schmidt made a clucking noise. "I'm sorry, sonny, but the last one was sold not twenty minutes ago. I'm afraid we're all out."

Reno blinked. "What?"

"It's Winter Day eve, people have been coming in and out all day. I'm surprised that one hadn't sold earlier, really. These collectibles are really popular," Schmidt said, stroking his long beard. He shrugged. "Anything else I can get you?"

Reno shook his head, disbelieving. "No. There's got to be a place I can get it."

Schmidt raised an eyebrow. "Well, sonny, unless you can find another shop that sells these around here, I'm afraid you're out of luck."

Now Reno was panicking. Shit. Shit, shit, shit. His mind easily conjured the disturbing image of himself dealing with urinal cakes, wiping shit off the stall walls, scrubbing bowls of porcelain. Why hadn't he started earlier? Why hadn't he paid closer attention to what the brat was looking at? This was all he could remember. Desperately, he flipped through the catalogue again, but nothing else was ringing any bells. Oh, shit. Shit, shit –

He turned desperately to the man standing calmly across the counter. "Damn it, not a store, then! A supply depot! Something! Where's the nearest one?"

Schmidt shook his head. "Sir, I'm going to have to ask you to calm down."

Reno's eyes bulged. "Calm down?! The hell I will! Tseng's gonna have my ass -"

Schmidt raised an eyebrow. "Sir, if you don't calm down -"

Suddenly, he came out with the dreaded billy club. Reno, in a panicked state stumbled back. Suddenly memories flashed through his brain like quicksilver, each getting more pained than the last.

_Pulling against his mother's hand as she dragged him through the department store past the displays of toys to Schmidt's booth –_

_Being made to sit on the fat man's lap and trying not to stare into those frightfully blue eyes – _

_The smack of the billy club as it came down on his bottom. The cheering and whooping from all the other kids around him –_

He heard a vague screaming from somewhere in his head, heard a rushing accompanying the screaming, felt his blood pouring between his ears. He felt a crack, and winced, crouching down. Then nothing.

For several moments, Reno lay sprawled on the floor of Cactaur Jack's Curiosity Shoppe, breathing hard. He looked to his right and screamed. When had the billy club gotten into his hand?

He flung the offensive thing from him, not giving the crash of tinkling glass any mind as he righted himself. When he stood up, he didn't see Sch – Cactaur Jack anywhere. He did, however, see something smoking from behind the counter.

Shakily making his way over, he peered over the counter and blinked.

Sch – Cactaur Jack lay there, a twitching, slightly steaming heap. Reno blinked again, not quite sure what had happened. "H – hey," he tried. Schmidt squeaked.

It was then that Reno registered the weight and feel of something cylindrical in his hand and looked down. His electro mag rod was in his left hand, powered down. He looked to Schmidt. To the now inert rod. Back to Schmidt.

"Oh, shit," he groaned.

_T-9:37_

Reno was now on his way to being thoroughly soused. After he had calmed down, he had crouched down in front of Schmidt to ask if the man was okay. He had nearly burst an eardrum at Schmidt's ear piercing shriek, and had managed to calm the man down enough to get him to write down the name and location of a distribution depot in Kalm. Jittery and disturbed by the whole incident and jarred further by Schmidt's near inhuman shrieking, Reno had tottered out of the store and into his car, where he had stared at his steering wheel for well over twenty minutes before putting the key in the ignition and high tailing it to Kalm. While somewhat proud that he had been able to pay the fat bastard back for all his childhood torment, he had still been shaken enough that he had immediately moved to the one and only bar that Kalm hosted. The rest of the time had been a blur.

And now, it was evening, a twinkling night that seemed rather blurry around the edges to Reno. The still functional part of his brain shrugged that off, knowing that the mako in his veins would take care of the alcohol in his system. He just had to get to the depot before the hangover part kicked in. Yeah. That was it.

Looking at the paper in his hands, Reno squinted. Just on the outskirts of town… that-a-way. Reno began walking.

* * *

Rod Haynes had worked in the Kalm distribution depot for nigh over ten years. It had been his only means of support for his wife and kids, the only thing that made the drudgery tolerable. When Elberta had up and left with his two daughters, claiming that she'd had enough of him and their stuffy, small town life, he had been shattered. Then had come the notice that she was entitled to half the house's contents by prenuptial agreement. He had come home one afternoon to find himself left with nothing but an all but empty fridge containing one egg and a recliner. He came home another afternoon to find that she had taken the cat. Then the clincher – he found out that Elberta was seeing Sedrick, his neighbour and best friend that worked at the depot with him.

When he had confronted Elberta about it one day, she had told him, in the middle of the day in the town square that he had always been rather dull, and that his one trick pony in bed wasn't standing up anymore.

And so he had sat in that recliner one night, and come to the grim realization that Elberta and Sedrick had been planning this all along. They had been playing him behind his back.

Well, he wasn't going to stand for it. They had mocked him long enough.

And so it was when Reno arrived in front of the Kalm distribution centre and heard the screams and saw the jagged stream of people running frantically in all directions, he knew that this was yet another way the fates were conspiring to make his day already rougher than it already was. He glared up into the sky, running through a number of choice phrases in his head before walking into the building.

The interior was deserted, the reception desk long abandoned. To the left and right of the desk were plain, grey painted doors. Reno shrugged and went through one of them.

In front of him was a wide open space with forklifts and boxes stacked neatly, waiting to be put upon the tall metal shelves lining the sides of the space, or else into the trucks waiting in the loading/unloading bays. In the middle of it all, set up like a stage play, was a hostage situation. There was a crazed looking middle aged man holding a gun to another man's temple. A third man stood in front of the first man, hands help up in a gesture of placation. It didn't seem to be working.

None of the three men took notice of the redhead as he sauntered casually, if a little bit unsteadily forward, nightstick tapping in an erratic rhythm against his thigh. As he got closer, he could hear the first man speaking rapidly. He caught the words "two-timing" and something that sounded like "Bertha".

Reno tapped the third, slightly desperate looking man on the shoulder. "Hey."

The man spun around, surprised. The gunman, eyes wide, spun around, pointing the weapon at Reno's chest. Never a wise idea. Reno decided to let it slide for now. Fishing in his pants pocket, he found what he was looking for. "You got this?" It was the page from the catalogue he had ripped at earlier at Cactaur Jack's.

The third man, evidently the foreman of the place, going by the plastic yellow tag on his chest that said "Foreman", gaped at him, making a clicking noise in his throat. Even the man being held at gunpoint turned around slightly, blinking at the redheaded Turk who gazed back, unfazed. The gunman twitched.

"Who the hell are you?" he asked, his left eye twitching.

Reno eyed him coolly. "I could ask the same of you." The booze was wearing off, making him less than people friendly right now.

"Who the hell am I? Who the hell are you asking me who the hell I am?!"

Reno merely raised a vivid eyebrow, which only caused the man to pale further. His whole face was twitching now, right eye joining the left with his mouth in a syncopated rhythm. He would have been less comical in Reno's eyes if it weren't for the fact that the man in front of him couldn't look any less threatening than if he were a housefly. In addition to a diamond patterned blue sweater, he was wearing squashy brown loafers with butter yellow socks that pooled out around his ankles, and muddy brown trousers. The way he was holding that gun, Reno would be willing to bet all the booze at the Turk bar back in Junon that he had never shot one in his life before. He resisted the urge to roll his eyes. Amateurs.

"Dammit, don't you look at me like that! You're just like the rest of them!" Rod sobbed. "Just like the rest of those good looking playboys that always get the girl without even trying. Breaking decent men's hearts with your fucking charm and – you're all just like _him_!" Rod jabbed the gun into the man's windpipe, causing him to make a noise halfway between a terrified cough and a consternated "nyugh!" sound.

The foreman stepped forward. "Please, Rod, you don't have to do this…"

"Don't I, Stan?" said Rod, his eyes darting from Stan the foreman to Reno, and to his intended victim. "They were planning it all along. I worked day after day, and -"

He choked on a sob. Stan took a step forward, and jumped back almost immediately when Rod raised his head and let out a piercing scream that Reno was sure had registered with the bats living in the caves down by the mines. Rod suddenly tightened his grip on his victim and in the same motion pulled back the safety on the gun.

It all happened in a split second. As Rod's finger closed on the trigger, Stan shouted, reaching an arm out toward the two men. In that second, Reno had a debate in his mind, shrugged and swung out with his nightstick. For a moment, Rod stood there, unblinking, mouth agape, looking very much like a fish out of water. He opened his mouth a couple of times, made a squeaking noise, then dropped like a sack of potatoes along with his victim. They lay in a crumpled heap on the floor, unmoving. Reno put the rod away, shaking his head. Twice in one day. This was getting to be a habit.

He looked down at Stan, who had been set on his bottom by the radius of the aftershock. Stan looked up at Reno, blinking and dazed. Their eyes met.

Reno smiled, pointing to the paper still in his hand.

"You got this?"

_T-6:07_

He was slumped into his sofa cushions, eyes closed. It had been a long day.

Opening his eyes, he looked over to the side and smirked at the small box sitting beside him on the next cushion. A long but _successful_ day. Across from him on his many times dented but ridiculously expensive end table was a bottle of scotch, uncapped and two thirds full. He had made an agreement with the bottle that it would be wholly empty by the end of the evening. The bottle had agreed that this was a good arrangement.

He was going to enjoy this night. And then he was going to give Yuffie her damned present. Then he was going to fly out to Costa and soak up the beach. Yeah, that sounded about right. Reno leaned back further in his cushions, his muscles relaxing and moulding to the soft leather.

A knock at his door brought him out of his pleasant reverie. He scowled. Who the hell was calling on him now?

Swinging open the door, he glowered at the all too happy blonde that shoved her way into his apartment, not bothering to ask if she could come in.

"Hi Reno! You look tired, have a long day?" She didn't wait for him to answer. "I just came by to drop off your gift. I got you in the exchange. You're a tough person to shop for you know that?" She placed a rectangular sized package wrapped up in sparkling blue paper, bedecked to within an inch of its life with bows and those curly things. He grimaced. Pointed.

"What's that?" Elena just gave him a 'What, are you stupid?' look, settling her hands on her hips. "Your Winter Day present, Reno. Did you even remember to buy one?"

Reno scoffed, holding a hand to where his heart was supposed to be. "Elena, you wound me. Would I forget something so important?"

The blonde before him merely raised an eyebrow. "I take that as a no?"

The redheaded Turk scowled at his junior. "That wasn't funny." He moved past her to the couch and picked the box up, tossing it to Elena. "For your information, I've had my present ready for hours."

Elena made a face. "Reno, is this what you're giving -"

"Yuffie? Yeah." Deciding he could do with a smoke now, he reached for the near empty packet on his table. "Took me fucking ages to find."

Elena looked at Reno strangely. "Reno, this is a box."

He took a puff on his cigarette and rolled his eyes. "El, it's what's inside the box that I'm giving the brat." He reached over and patted Elena on the head, who stepped back, but not before swatting him rather hard across the nose. He rubbed at the sore spot and scowled. "What?"

The box and Elena's gift to him were shoved in front of his face. "Reno, can you tell me the difference between these two?" she asked sweetly.

Reno blinked. He took a slow drag on his cigarette. "No."

An exasperated sigh. "Take a closer look."

He did, even going so far as to tilt his head first to the left, then at a ninety degree angle the other way. After a minute or so of deep thought, he shrugged, righting himself. "No idea, El. You gonna let me in on the big secret or keep me guessing here?"

"Reno, the present I got you is wrapped. Yours is not. Now do you see what's wrong?" She spoke slowly, enunciating each word carefully, as if speaking to a backwards child.

A blink. Another blink. "So… you're saying that I should wrap it?"

"Yes!" Elena practically shouted. "Seriously, Reno, you're really bad at this whole holiday thing." She shook her head at him. "I'm going now, Reno. Just wrap the thing before giving it to Yuffie, all right?"

Reno smirked. "Yes, mother. Anything else I should know?"

"You're not going to stoop so low as to get a card, are you?"

Another smirk, this one wider than the last. "You got it, babe."

The blonde Turk rolled her eyes. "Whatever. It's better than the alternative. See you around, Reno."

He raised an eyebrow. "What's the rush, Laney?"

"I'm going on holiday." She said this breezily, evidently already there in her mind.

"With anyone special?"

She looked back at him. "Thought you would already know."

"Give baldy my regards."

Elena raised her eyebrows, but otherwise said nothing. With a click, the door closed behind her, leaving Reno staring at the box-soon-to-be-present sitting innocuously on his couch.

"Couldn't make this easy for me, could you?" he muttered to it.

_T-5:50_

They sat across from one another. Reno was poker faced, staring his opponent down. His opponent was just as unyielding, sitting in stony silence. Reno lit a cigarette casually, taking in a puff before exhaling slowly. He leaned back slightly, eyeing his opponent before speaking at last.

"So. It's come to this, huh?"

His nemesis said nothing.

"Bet you think you're hot stuff." Another puff.

"Well…" He stubbed out his cigarette in a vaguely menacing fashion, bits of nicotine and paper crumbling with the ash in his tray. "You'll soon find out that you're not as tough as everyone thinks you are."

The still unwrapped present sat in its place on the table, lacking for a witty comeback. Reno smiled, a jagged white smile that would have set it trembling but for one fact…

_T-4:27_

"Shit!"

The loud expletive tore a staccato burst through the still air in Reno's apartment. The apartment itself looked as if Chaos had burst loose and wreaked havoc, shredding paper and mangling perfectly innocent ribbons along the way.

Amid the wreckage, one very frustrated Turk sat, struggling to hold down the box holding Yuffie's present and tape down some wrapping paper at the same time. For all the aggravated growling and swearing, and the sheer effort the man was making, one would have thought that this was a wayward terrorist or serial murderer he was trying to hold down. As it was, the poor present itself wasn't holding up very well in this fight between man and cardboard box – it resembled nothing so much as a mummy, death wrapped in cellophane tape with wrapping paper patched across it abortively; ribbons made jagged protrusions, and the whole thing was reminiscent of a very badly packaged letter bomb. He would have hurled the thing accordingly out the window had it not been for the fact that he wasn't so stupid as to throw away hours of effort because of more hours of fruitless effort. He would get this thing wrapped, damn it, if it was the last thing he did.

Picking at a bit of tape that had stuck to his pant leg, Reno tossed it away irately, growing more annoyed when the sticky end wouldn't let go of his finger. He let go of the present, yanking the tape off with the other hand and balling it up. He felt somewhat satisfied when the offensive ball of former tape landed in a wastepaper basket that was growing ever higher with its shunned brethren. The satisfaction lasted for about three seconds, when he realized that by letting go of the present, he had let go of the wrapping paper, which had come loose without his hand to restrain it.

He let out another string of swears, holding down the mounting urge to take out his nightstick and fry the trouble making package. No. He'd already caused enough damage for one day with it.

Running a hand through increasingly tousled hair, he reached for the bottle of scotch, which was down to the last dregs. He finished that, then reached for the rum he'd brought in from the other room; a part of him had known that this would be a mission requiring less sobriety and more sanity, and had planned ahead.

Undoing the bottle's stopper with his teeth, he took a swig from it, then looked at the motley present once more.

"You're going down. If it's the last thing I do, you're gonna get wrapped."

_T-4:23_

"…"

_T-3:24_

Reno reached for his PHS. The voice that answered on the other end sounded annoyed.

"Yes?"

"Tseng?"

"What is it, Reno?"

"I need to call in a favour."

_T-0:21_

The young woman standing outside her apartment door looked at Reno, confused. "So… this is new, Turkey. They run out of letter bombs, or is that a real present?" She pointed to the newly wrapped, shiny, beribboned thing in his hands.

Reno shifted the present to one hand so he could flip her off with the other. "Up yours, brat."

An ebony eyebrow rose so high that it was hidden in her bangs. "Sooo… this really is a present, then?"

Reno ran a hand across his eyes. He was tired, the booze was already wearing off, and god damn it, he could be anywhere else but here right now. "Just take the damned present, Yuffie."

She did, holding it both hands, treating it cautiously as if it might explode in her face, or otherwise turn out to be a dead carcass. She lifted her eyes to his. "You're absolutely sure this is a present?"

"Yes it is. If you'd bother to open the piece of crap, you'd see, wouldn't you?" He was near the end of his tether. If she didn't shut up and open it right now, he was going to strangle her scrawny little neck.

Yuffie grinned then, and he felt gratified, if for no other reason than that the smile seemed to indicate that she was done torturing him with her obtuseness and ready to open the thing.

"Can I open it now?"

He felt his good humour returning. "It's Winter Day, isn't it, babe?"

She nodded. Without further ado, she tore into the present Tseng had so carefully wrapped, trying not to think about the price he'd had to pay for it. When she got down to the box, she shook it, holding it up to her ear. She frowned a bit, biting down on her lip in an expression of consternation. For some reason, Reno found this amusing, though he did nothing save lean against the doorframe, watching her re-enact the age old custom of guessing the gift before it was totally unwrapped. She didn't even seem to mind that it hadn't come with a card.

When she had divested the present of all its extraneous wrapping, she let out a squeal that simultaneously collapsed his eardrums and absurdly pleased him. He had always been able to decipher the various sound effects of the female half of the species, and this was nothing sort of outright adulation and happiness, wrapped in one shiny package.

He felt a hundred and twenty odd pounds of ninja barrelling into his arms. He absorbed the impact, helped by the doorframe. Yuffie was practically bouncing in his arms, smiling for all she was worth, and for Reno, that gave all this torture he had gone through its own worth; he had done well, his mind affirmed.

"How did you know?" She was asking, holding the present in both hands, while still somehow managing to stay in Reno's embrace, bouncing like a five year old on the sugar high of a lifetime.

"Remember that catalogue you were looking at the other day? The one you got me on the head with?"

Yuffie's eyes widened. "Oh."

"Yeah. Oh." He grinned ferally. "Left a dent on my head for days. How could I forget after a stunt like that?"

"I'm sorry," she said, though she didn't really sound all that apologetic to him. Not that he really cared anymore. He had gotten her what she had wanted, and she was happy, wasn't she?

She did something that surprised him then. Leaning up on tip toe, kissed him around on jaw. She had been aiming for his cheek, but height differences worked out to be a bitch. She grinned impishly. "Thanks."

Still gob smacked, Reno nodded. "Sure thing, princess."

Hell, maybe this Winter Day wasn't as bad as he had chalked it up to be after all.

Yuffie reached up again and ruffled his hair. "By the way, you look like you've been playing with the wrong end of your mag rod." He gave her the finger in response. She poked her tongue out in retaliation and made to move back into her apartment. Reno stood there for a couple of seconds before making that split second decision.

"Hey, brat?"

Yuffie turned around. "Yeah?"

With the lightning fast reflexes that had served him well in his tenure as a Turk, he had her pinned to the doorjamb before she could even blink. She opened her mouth to say something, but the words couldn't get out, trapped as they were by Reno's lips. She stiffened for a moment, then relaxed, returning the kiss. Her arms looped around his shoulders, and Reno chuckled, realizing that she was standing on her tiptoes to do it. Then she kissed him again, and he let the height difference thing slide.

Yeah, he thought. Maybe the whole Winter Day thing wasn't as bad as he thought.

* * *

_Author's Notes:_ Done! Finally! This took me ages to write, and I angsted about it for just as long, as I'm wont to do with most of my writing. Mostly, I started off thinking this was going to be humour, and then I realized that it mostly reads like a series of unfortunate events. So take it as what you will.

Thanks to Ealinesse (Read her stuff! It's fecking awesome and overshadows anything I could possibly write in the Reffie department) for reading through the bits I had written and offering some positive feedback that made me feel better about the whole thing. And thanks also to Zee, who stopped me fretting about the sheer length of this thing by saying, "Look, you're you. You've never done things the short way, so what makes you think this fic would turn out the same?" Or something close to that. I'm verbose, I can't help it.

Comment, criticize (be helpful about it, please). I'm going to drop right now. Falls over Merry Christmas, everyone.


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